Iowa River Landing Sculpture Walk

Fusing Visual Art & LiteratureEleven permanent sculptures create the The Iowa River Landing Sculpture Walk. The works were installed in 2013 and were made possible through an Iowa Department of Cultural Affairs Great Places grant and City of Coralville funds.

About the CollectionEach sculpture is by an Iowa artist and is based on a work in the Iowa Writer's Library, located in the Coralville Marriott Hotel and Conference Center. The collection of approximately 800 books written by former students, graduates, and faculty of the nationally renowned Iowa Writers’ Workshop at the University of Iowa is maintained by the Coralville Public Library.

The sculptures are owned and maintained by the City of Coralville.

LocationThe sculpture park is located in the Iowa River Landing, just off I-80 exit 242. The self-guided sculpture walk begins on the trail just east of Quarry Road and E. 7th Street. Get directions

Artist statement: “Marvin Bell thinks his wife, Dorothy, is beautiful because of her flaws and characteristics that make her unique. The poem focuses on what characteristics make Dorothy unique by saying that she is ‘beautiful, inexactly.’ Marvin accepts her flaws-the key to any love.”

Artist statement: “In Mark Levine’s poem “Arboretum,” he explores the tradition of the arboretum as a way to probe man’s interactions with nature. My sculptures are techno-biotic representations of nature, and they aestheticize nature as a slick synthesis of old and new technology. In this relationship I see irony and cynicism, but also hope and excitement.”

Artist statement: “This novel is the story of fathers and sons and my sculpture is an interpretation of this family of men. The piece consists of a series of 4-graduated steel tubes nesting inside of each other with the smallest made from stainless steel. Like the rings of a tree or ripples on a pond, expanding outward, each sleeve represents a man in this story.”

Artist statement: “This novel presents Vonnegut’s consideration of the role wealth plays in achieving happiness. The protagonist is a WWII decorated veteran and an heir to an immense fortune. The war changes him and he decides to help people philanthropically, eventually opening an office in Rosewater, Indiana with a sign above his door reading ‘Rosewater Foundation: How Can We Help You?’”

Literary reference:The Man Who Fell in Love with a Chicken, 1980 by David B. Axelrod (American, b. 1943)

Artist statement: “I have created a sculpture of the noble chicken, as described in the poem by David B. Axelrod. The Iowa Blue Chicken is the only breed of chicken that was created in the state of Iowa and bred to survive Iowa’s harsh winters and its hot summers.”

Artist statement: “An alidade is an instrument used by astronomers. My intention is for the form of the sculpture to resemble this tool while implying a shift in scale through a sort of forced perspective. The sculpture is composed of recognizable elements such as architectural structures and backyard fences combined with abstract references to the Iowa landscape and planetary orbits.”

Artist Statement: “I am moved by Jorie Graham’s poetry …. my work is a kind of parallel to Graham’s, creating a vision of a thing from several different conceptual angles at once. While the object appears to be a figure, in reality the subject is the memory.”

Literary reference:Where Water Comes Together with Other Water: Poems, 1986 by Raymond Carver (American, 1938-1988)

Artist statement: “My art work is a derivative visual language inspired by my Asian-American heritage. I splice visual elements together to create a visual poetry. From the River is a depiction of a lowly river carp. I’ve dressed this carp in linear patterns that reference Frank Lloyd Wright’s stained glass windows, bringing nature, environment, and design into 1 form.”

Literary reference: “Landscape-Iowa” by James Hearst (American, 1900-1983) from The Good Earth: Three Poets of the Prairie / Paul Engle, James Hearst, and William Stafford, 2002 by Robert Dana, Scott Cawelti, and Denise Low with a foreword by Michael Carey

Artist statement: “This work references the motion of prairie grass as it’s nearly flattened and almost torn off the soil and rock that it clings to by the wind. As a seat, this sculpture allows the viewer to find a moment of calm on an ergonomic shape while staring at the sky.”

Artist statement: “The book is based on Shakespeare’s King Lear. In this story an aging farmer wishes to bestow upon his three daughters his kingdom: fields of 10-foot-thick topsoil. This sculpture depicts the figures of the three daughters, menacingly draped and surrounded in sheets of corrugated metal representing the farm fields and the secrets they hold.”